


Finding You Beneath the Bruises

by DjDangerLove



Series: Tarlos March Madness [4]
Category: 9-1-1: Lone Star (TV 2020)
Genre: 2x08 but with more hurt/comfort and angst than I expect, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 17:29:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29844975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DjDangerLove/pseuds/DjDangerLove
Summary: “Babe,” Carlos’ voice seems to reverberate in the bathroom, in his ears, in this moment of time.  “You gotta let me in.” TK flinches, the request feeling like another open wound among the many he’s forced to bare to everyone. TK meets his gaze in the mirror again, shame distorting his eyes with unshed tears. “There’s no hiding this.”Or: TK tries to deal with the aftermath of being held hostage. Carlos helps.
Relationships: Carlos Reyes/TK Strand
Series: Tarlos March Madness [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2189232
Comments: 40
Kudos: 345





	Finding You Beneath the Bruises

**Author's Note:**

> Tarlos March Madness #4 of 31

TK stares at his reflection in the mirror, tracing the marks of one man’s desperation left across his face while trying to hold back the tidal wave of his own. Jammed fingers held together with medical tape already frayed at the edges from his anxious energy sweep across the deep bruise staining the pale skin of his cheek, following the curvature up under his eye. The sticky ends of the tape bite at the scabbing cuts above his brow that disappear into his hairline. 

His fingers gravitate to his split lip, swollen in all the wrong ways and impossible not to prod with his tongue. He feels the sting as the cut pulls before his fingers sink lower, gliding over two day old stubble and falling into place against the handprint stained into the skin of his neck in shades of deep purples fading into blue. 

The memories manifest to tremors, hands quivering at the inability to grasp at an emotion that feels safe. Carlos appears in the mirror behind his reflection, knuckles tapping gently on the doorframe despite their eyes meeting in the glass. TK looks away, bottom lip trembling in tempo with the hand still at his neck. He feels dirty in a way that makes his past addiction appear clean. 

Shame settles heavy in his belly, churning like rough sea water on the front of a storm, a warning for something beyond his control. Teeth clench across the cut on his lip, fingers curled against their unwillingness to bend as Carlos steps forward. He feels the heat of him at his back, the lack of his touch in his soul but who would want his filth on their fingers. 

“Babe,” Carlos’ voice seems to reverberate in the bathroom, in his ears, in this moment of time. “You gotta let me in.”

TK flinches, the request feeling like another open wound among the many he’s forced to bare to everyone. TK meets his gaze in the mirror again, shame distorting his eyes with unshed tears. “There’s no hiding this.”

Carlos’ arms slowly wind around his waist like beautiful ivy growing on an abandoned building. “You have nothing to hide,” he whispers against his shoulder, sealing the declaration with a warm kiss pressed to the back of his neck. “And nothing to hide from.”

TK doesn’t give into the embrace, body rigid with a discomfort put there by someone else. The unfairness spills down his face, leaving damp streaks in its wake. He turns from the mirror, twisting in Carlos’ hold so they’re facing one another and the only reflection of him to exist is the untainted one Carlos still clings to. 

“When he kept me,” TK breathes life into the memories chewing at his nerves, “and let Tommy and Nancy go…I thought that was the last time I was ever going to see any of you again.”

“But it wasn’t,” Carlos narrates softly, knowing his mind leaves out that part of the story. Carlos taps him under the chin so their eyes meet. “You survived. You’re here with me.”

“Am I?” The question swells between them forcing Carlos back a step, arms loosening but not letting go. “Because between the bruises and the nightmares, it still feels like he’s got a hold of me.”

Sadness ripples across Carlos’ face leaving sympathy sitting heavy in the lines around his eyes. “Is that what you think when you look at these?” His fingertips are gentle across the cuts on TK’s forehead, warm against the bruise under his eye.

“How do you not?”  
His disbelief has him turning away from the touch, but Carlos chases him with the same resolve to love him as he did in the beginning and hugs him close, ghosting a whisper of, “Do you trust me?” across the sweat damp skin of TK’s neck.

“Always.”

Carlos kisses the darkest shade of purple on his throat before reaching for the hem of TK’s shirt. “Then let me show you what I see.”

TK is pliant underneath his hands like a dead leaf to an autumn wind as Carlos removes TK’s shirt, his pants and his boxers. He’s pulled to the edge of the shower, left to stand in his dirtiness as Carlos leans away to turn the water on and rid himself of his own clothes. When steam billows around the glass stall, Carlos curls damp fingers around his arm and tugs him into the shower. 

Carlos brings them to stand under the spray and TK watches the way the water cascades across his boyfriend’s unblemished skin. He wants to feel more than the heat of the water at the sight of it, tries to stoke the flames in his belly by reaching out with sodden taped fingers and dragging them across caramel skin. 

But Carlos catches him by the wrist, strong fingers steady against the startled pulse beneath them. He pulls away in embarrassment , but Carlos refuses to let go, guiding TK’s wrist to his lips and pressing a kiss against the pulse point before letting the water wash it away with a swipe of his thumb. 

TK wishes the rest were that easy to clean, that the rosewood in Carlos’ desired soap could discolor the bruises and seal the cuts both inside and out. Carlos reaches for it regardless, squeezing a generous drop onto a soaked washcloth and returning it to the tiled shelf. 

“I’ll start here,” Carlos says, rubbing the cloth between his hands and lathering the soap before pressing the corner of it against the cuts splitting the skin on TK’s brow so gently that TK doesn’t even feel the sting. 

“These cuts remind me how stubborn you are,” Carlos explains as he runs the cloth gently across his forehead. He pushes it back through his hair once, deploying soap between the strands before tenderly scratching at his scalp with blunt fingernails. “How you refused to let him harm your family.”

TK shakes his head under Carlos’ fingers, whimpering when the man just tips his head back into the spray and rinses the soap out. He blinks the water out of his eyes when Carlos lets go and meets the man’s soft gaze through the steam surrounding them. “I didn’t-“

Carlos shakes his head with a soft tut barely audible over the sound of the shower spray hitting the tiled floor. “I’m showing you what _I_ see.” 

He takes the cloth and holds it under the water again then guides it across the bruise painting the skin around his left eye. “And this reminds me that you never look away from danger, never turn your back on someone in need no matter their circumstance.”

TK bites his lip to keep it from trembling, ignoring the metallic taste in his mouth as a cut breaks apart. Carlos meets him there, the soft, warm cotton of the cloth washing the faint pink rivulets of blood from his chin. “And this reminds me that you’re never quiet,” he chuckles, catching the unscathed corner of TK’s mouth with the edge of the cloth to playfully push it up into a smile. “That you always speak up for those who need it.”  
TK catches Carlos’ wrist with quivering fingers, a gesture he’s not even sure the meaning of but desperate for Carlos to understand. The man steps closer, putting a breath of space between them, and runs the washcloth down the length of TK’s arm, dislodging his fingers from around his wrist only to wash the length of his injured hand. “And this reminds me of the way you care for the world even if you need to be cared for twice as much.”

“Carlos…” TK trails off as his breath comes easier than it has in days. He swallows thickly, Adam’s apple probing at the handprint claiming the expanse of his neck. Where shame hung heavy around it before, it feels weightless to bare the stain to Carlos now as he runs the soap drenched cloth over it. 

“And this…baby, this reminds me of how strong you are, of how one man’s desperation is nothing compared to your determination to live.” 

TK’s hand replaces Carlos’ against the hand shaped bruise. “You really believe that?”

“How could I not?” 

Carlos finishes mapping out the rest of TK’s body with the cloth before discarding it across the faucet and letting the water rinse TK the rest of the way clean. Reaching out as the water begins to turn cold, TK brings Carlos under the spray until their bodies are pressed together in a way to kindle something intimate, but with a love that lets them stand there in a meaning more significant . 

“It’s okay to feel lost, Ty,” Carlos says into the crook of his neck, hugging him close enough that TK still feels warm under cold water. "I’m always going to find you.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Kudos are appreciated. Comments are food.  
> Come find me at DjDangerLove on tumblr


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